Web Design Biz

[TylerL]

Do you guys use templates and put them on Dreamweaver? or do you make the sites from scratch.

I personally create the template in Photoshop then hand code it in Notepad.

 

[villain85]

I make sites pretty well, however, I want to use templates so I can streamline the design process so I can focus on delegating other task and concentrate on marketing/advertising

 

[Sidewindr]

Nice to see a fellow Texan. Good luck with the biz.

 

[crunchi]

I personally create the template in Photoshop then hand code it in Notepad.

heh pretty guru method, you must eat and shit in html..

I use Dreamweaver because it's very easy, you can build complex site with over 50sliced parts in just few minutes or less

 

[hfgreg]

Don't waste your time advertising online. Way too many people doing the same thing. Like Barman said, your only way to get started is to network. Maybe even start by giving a free design to a guy that has connections, the more people he tells about you the better off you'll be. 90% of the time these guys are going to be using the same source for their designs. Look at a lot of your local web sites. They may in fact be done by the same company/person and you can tell, because they all equally suck. I hate seeing these $5000 designs that look like a 5th grader threw them together as a school project, it's ridiculous. Put a good product together and you're bound to get leads.

 

[LazyD]

Im not a big fan of using premade templates. The biggest thing is if your client is satisfied, if they are satisfied with a premade template then so be it....

I did make my clients last time from a template - They couldnt decide on what they wanted and I showed them a few free templates and they fell in love with one and insisted that I use it. I personally think that I could have done one better, but they are the client, the customer and the customer is always right...

I agree with Barman, SEO services and things like that are the perfect upsell especially since they often take less leg work making them great extra "addons"

Also, Dreamweaver sucks a big floppy donkey dick... If your going to use it, at least understand the code its putting down... Theres nothing worse then seeing some jackass who thinks hes great at web design because he can use Dreamweaver get stuck because it did something stupid and he doesnt know whats going on the code to fix it...

Personally, I use Photoshop and Ultraedit-32 (Has built in FTP...)

 

[bgmacaw]

Well targeted niche marketing works the best and will make you the most money. For example, I mostly concentrate on the healthcare field. Often word of mouth will get you jobs this way because friend-of-friends will start calling you to ask for your services. The richer and more widespread the niche is the more you'll make.

Another potential local market is to find businesses that have badly designed websites. They usually paid for a quicky offshored job and it turned out to be something somebody slapped together in Dreamweaver or FrontPage in a couple of hours. You have to sell them on your credibility and skills but you can often win a great customer and get good referrals this way.

Also bear in mind that you can often sell customers who don't have a pre-existing website a package deal of web design, hosting, and on-going support. If you have a hosting resale account you can make a good residual income off this as they pay you $100+ a month for "website support services" while your actual cost is quite low. Also, if you want to be a little evil, have yourself listed as the domain owner so they can't go transfering the domain away without you knowing about it, and yes, charging another fee for them doing it.

 

[Nick]

The best tip I can give you when you're going local is to NETWORK like a fiend.

This is exactly what you need to be doing. I used to work for a web dev agency and they would have some kind of event/party every so often, inviting clients, friends, business associates. Just putting yourself out there and building a rapport with people can bring in future business and often they come to you.
The more people who know you design/develop websites the better.

People know its something that i do and every so often ask me or refer me to people who need sites done. This is from me not even trying, because I prefer to develop my own sites and generally dislike dealing with clients!

 

[Nemesis]

I'm planning this kind of biz too. I started on sitepoint because I didn't have any previous work and connections. I did 7 or 8 designs. Some of them were fantastic but I only sold one. For $350 (concept and logo). All the others just take ideas and run.

So this summer, I'm planning to learn coding, working with wordpress and specializing in content sites and blogs.